One of the most widely discussed issues in banking regulation and research is transparency. Yet, whether depositors – banks’ most important claimholders – are affected by transparency, is an empirical open question. Analyzing US commercial banks from 1994 to 2019, we show that uninsured deposit flows are more sensitive to information about bank performance when banks are more transparent. We also link transparency to deposit rates, banks’ investment funding patterns, and profitability. In addition, we find consistent evidence from a differences-in-difference analysis using the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 as a shock to transparency. Overall, our findings demonstrate that transparency is important in shaping depositors’ behavior and highlight its potential costs.

银行监管和研究中讨论最广泛的问题之一是透明度。然而，储户——银行最重要的债权持有人——是否受到透明度的影响，是一个经验性的悬而未决的问题。通过对 1994 年至 2019 年美国商业银行的分析，我们发现当银行更加透明时，未投保的存款流量对银行业绩信息更加敏感。我们还将透明度与存款利率、银行的投资融资模式和盈利能力联系起来。此外，我们从使用 2002 年萨班斯-奥克斯利法案的差异分析中发现了一致的证据，作为对透明度的冲击。总体而言，我们的研究结果表明，透明度对于塑造存款人的行为并突出其潜在成本非常重要。